It was supposed to be a visit to mark the Queen’s diamond jubilee – a chance to present the modern
But it really didn’t turn out that way.
When the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge end their week-long tour of the Caribbean on Saturday, they will report back that the tour may have accelerated moves to ditch the Queen as the head of state.
Read more at:
‘Perfect storm’: royals misjudged Caribbean tour, say critics | Monarchy | The Guardian
Showing posts with label Decline. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Decline. Show all posts
3/25/22
2/6/22
USA: America is falling apart at the seams -by David Brooks
In June a statistic floated across my desk that startled me. In 2020, the number of miles Americans drove fell 13% because of the pandemic, but the number of traffic deaths rose 7%.
I couldn’t figure it out. Why would Americans be driving so much more recklessly during the pandemic? But then in the first half of 2021, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, motor vehicle deaths were up 18.4% even over 2020. Contributing factors, according to the agency, included driving under the influence, speeding and failure to wear a seat belt.
Why are so many Americans driving irresponsibly?
While gloomy numbers like these were rattling around in my brain, a Substack article from Matthew Yglesias hit my inbox this week. It was titled “All Kinds of Bad Behavior Is on the Rise.” Not only is reckless driving on the rise, Yglesias pointed out, but the number of altercations on airplanes has exploded, the murder rate is surging in cities, drug overdoses are increasing, Americans are drinking more, nurses say patients are getting more abusive, and so on and so on.
Read more at: David Brooks: America is falling apart at the seams | Commentary | myheraldreview.com
I couldn’t figure it out. Why would Americans be driving so much more recklessly during the pandemic? But then in the first half of 2021, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, motor vehicle deaths were up 18.4% even over 2020. Contributing factors, according to the agency, included driving under the influence, speeding and failure to wear a seat belt.
Why are so many Americans driving irresponsibly?
While gloomy numbers like these were rattling around in my brain, a Substack article from Matthew Yglesias hit my inbox this week. It was titled “All Kinds of Bad Behavior Is on the Rise.” Not only is reckless driving on the rise, Yglesias pointed out, but the number of altercations on airplanes has exploded, the murder rate is surging in cities, drug overdoses are increasing, Americans are drinking more, nurses say patients are getting more abusive, and so on and so on.
Read more at: David Brooks: America is falling apart at the seams | Commentary | myheraldreview.com
1/14/22
USA: Jan. 6 anniversary most Americans feel US democracy is in peril - by Chelsey Cox, Amy Nakamura
A suggestion posed by Rep. Dan Crenshaw, R-Texas during an interview on Fox News Channel to use Federal Emergency Management Agency resources in expanding COVID-19 testing access was shot down by Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga, on social media.
"No FEMA should not set up testing sites to check for Omicron sneezes, coughs, and runny noses," Greene posted to her Gab.com account Sunday. "He needs to stop calling himself conservative, he’s hurting our brand."
Read more Jan. 6 anniversary most Americans feel US democracy is in peril
"No FEMA should not set up testing sites to check for Omicron sneezes, coughs, and runny noses," Greene posted to her Gab.com account Sunday. "He needs to stop calling himself conservative, he’s hurting our brand."
Read more Jan. 6 anniversary most Americans feel US democracy is in peril
5/24/21
EU Automobile Industry:New battery-electric vehicles take 5.7% share in Europe in Q1; hybrids 18.4%, gasoline 42.2% , diesel 23.2%
In the first quarter of 2021, hybrid electric vehicles made up 18.4% of total passenger car sales in the EU, almost doubling their market share in a year, according to data from the European Association of Automobile Manufacturers (ACEA). Demand for electrically-chargeable cars also increased in Q1: battery-electric vehicles made up 5.7% of all new cars, while plug-in hybrids accounted for 8.2% of EU registrations.
Sales of traditional fossil-fuel cars continued to decrease in the European Union, although gasoline and diesel still made up 65.4% of the car market.
Read more at: New battery-electric vehicles take 5.7% share in Europe in Q1; hybrids 18.4%, gasoline 42.2% , diesel 23.2% - Green Car Congress
Sales of traditional fossil-fuel cars continued to decrease in the European Union, although gasoline and diesel still made up 65.4% of the car market.
Read more at: New battery-electric vehicles take 5.7% share in Europe in Q1; hybrids 18.4%, gasoline 42.2% , diesel 23.2% - Green Car Congress
4/21/21
The state of Democracy: Is Democracy in Decline Globally? - by Frank Vogl
The fact that the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) underscores that the United States is a “flawed democracy” and far behind its northern neighbor Canada — a “full democracy” — in its new annual Democracy Index should escape nobody’s attention.
It is a sad testimony to the parlous state of democracy in today’s world — and the true legacy of Donald Trump’s stint in the White House.
Read more at: Is Democracy in Decline Globally? - The Globalist
It is a sad testimony to the parlous state of democracy in today’s world — and the true legacy of Donald Trump’s stint in the White House.
Read more at: Is Democracy in Decline Globally? - The Globalist
4/5/21
'USA - Evangelical right challenged: Allergic reaction to US religious right' fueling decline of religion, experts say - by Adam Gabatt
Fewer than half of Americans belong to a house of worship, a new study shows, but religion – and Christianity in particular – continues to have an outsize influence in US politics, especially because it is declining faster among Democrats than Republicans.
Just 47% of the US population are members of a church, mosque or synagogue, according to a survey by Gallup, down from 70% two decades ago – in part a result of millennials turning away from religion but also, experts say, a reaction to the swirling mix of rightwing politics and Christianity pursued by the Republican party.
The evidence comes as Republicans in some states have pursued extreme “Christian nationalist” policies, attempting to force their version of Christianity on an increasingly uninterested public.
Read more at: 'Allergic reaction to US religious right' fueling decline of religion, experts say | World news | The Guardian
Just 47% of the US population are members of a church, mosque or synagogue, according to a survey by Gallup, down from 70% two decades ago – in part a result of millennials turning away from religion but also, experts say, a reaction to the swirling mix of rightwing politics and Christianity pursued by the Republican party.
The evidence comes as Republicans in some states have pursued extreme “Christian nationalist” policies, attempting to force their version of Christianity on an increasingly uninterested public.
Read more at: 'Allergic reaction to US religious right' fueling decline of religion, experts say | World news | The Guardian
8/27/20
Capitalism: if it can still be revived, needs a complete overhaul
Capitalism’s failures arise from two of its defining elements. The first is perpetual growth. Economic growth is the aggregate effect of the quest to accumulate capital and extract profit. Capitalism collapses without growth, yet perpetual growth on a finite planet leads inexorably to environmental calamity.
Those who defend capitalism argue that, as consumption switches from goods to services, economic growth can be decoupled from the use of material resources. A paper in the journal New Political Economy, by Jason Hickel and Giorgos Kallis, examined this premise. They found that while some relative decoupling took place in the 20th century (material resource consumption grew, but not as quickly as economic growth), in the 21st century there has been a recoupling: rising resource consumption has so far matched or exceeded the rate of economic growth. The absolute decoupling needed to avert environmental catastrophe (a reduction in material resource use) has never been achieved, and appears impossible while economic growth continues. Green growth is an illusion.
A system based on perpetual growth cannot function without peripheries and externalities. There must always be an extraction zone – from which materials are taken without full payment – and a disposal zone, where costs are dumped in the form of waste and pollution. As the scale of economic activity increases until capitalism affects everything, from the atmosphere to the deep ocean floor, the entire planet becomes a sacrifice zone: we all inhabit the periphery of the profit-making machine.
This drives us towards cataclysm on such a scale that most people have no means of imagining it. The threatened collapse of our life-support systems is bigger by far than war, famine, pestilence or economic crisis, though it is likely to incorporate all four. Societies can recover from these apocalyptic events, but not from the loss of soil, an abundant biosphere and a habitable climate.
There is no going back: the alternative to capitalism is neither feudalism nor state communism. Soviet communism had more in common with capitalism than the advocates of either system would care to admit. Both systems are (or were) obsessed with generating economic growth. Both are willing to inflict astonishing levels of harm in pursuit of this and other ends. Both promised a future in which we would need to work for only a few hours a week, but instead demand endless, brutal labour. Both are dehumanising. Both are absolutist, insisting that theirs and theirs alone is the one true God.
From March to June 2020, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos saw his wealth rise by an estimated $48 billion. The journal might also have added that 40 million workers had filed for unemployment compensation and that prison labor was being paid $1 per hour to fight deadly forest fires in California.
Bezos describes his strategy similarly, asserting that “the stronger our market leadership, the more powerful our economic model…we will make bold rather than timid investment decisions where we see a sufficient probability of gaining market leadership advantages.” Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has conveyed the same approach, but more to-the-point; for many years, he allegedly ended staff meetings shouting, “Domination!”
The cliché is that we are all in this together. This is so only in the sense that some of us own luxury yachts capacious enough to hold luxury lifeboats while the bottom third clings to leaky life preservers. The mortgages of even many middle-class citizens are soon to be underwater.
Those who defend capitalism argue that, as consumption switches from goods to services, economic growth can be decoupled from the use of material resources. A paper in the journal New Political Economy, by Jason Hickel and Giorgos Kallis, examined this premise. They found that while some relative decoupling took place in the 20th century (material resource consumption grew, but not as quickly as economic growth), in the 21st century there has been a recoupling: rising resource consumption has so far matched or exceeded the rate of economic growth. The absolute decoupling needed to avert environmental catastrophe (a reduction in material resource use) has never been achieved, and appears impossible while economic growth continues. Green growth is an illusion.
A system based on perpetual growth cannot function without peripheries and externalities. There must always be an extraction zone – from which materials are taken without full payment – and a disposal zone, where costs are dumped in the form of waste and pollution. As the scale of economic activity increases until capitalism affects everything, from the atmosphere to the deep ocean floor, the entire planet becomes a sacrifice zone: we all inhabit the periphery of the profit-making machine.
This drives us towards cataclysm on such a scale that most people have no means of imagining it. The threatened collapse of our life-support systems is bigger by far than war, famine, pestilence or economic crisis, though it is likely to incorporate all four. Societies can recover from these apocalyptic events, but not from the loss of soil, an abundant biosphere and a habitable climate.
There is no going back: the alternative to capitalism is neither feudalism nor state communism. Soviet communism had more in common with capitalism than the advocates of either system would care to admit. Both systems are (or were) obsessed with generating economic growth. Both are willing to inflict astonishing levels of harm in pursuit of this and other ends. Both promised a future in which we would need to work for only a few hours a week, but instead demand endless, brutal labour. Both are dehumanising. Both are absolutist, insisting that theirs and theirs alone is the one true God.
From March to June 2020, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos saw his wealth rise by an estimated $48 billion. The journal might also have added that 40 million workers had filed for unemployment compensation and that prison labor was being paid $1 per hour to fight deadly forest fires in California.
Bezos describes his strategy similarly, asserting that “the stronger our market leadership, the more powerful our economic model…we will make bold rather than timid investment decisions where we see a sufficient probability of gaining market leadership advantages.” Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has conveyed the same approach, but more to-the-point; for many years, he allegedly ended staff meetings shouting, “Domination!”
The cliché is that we are all in this together. This is so only in the sense that some of us own luxury yachts capacious enough to hold luxury lifeboats while the bottom third clings to leaky life preservers. The mortgages of even many middle-class citizens are soon to be underwater.
What does it mean to have wealth approaching six-figure billions? Sen. Everett Dirksen once famously quipped “a billion here and a billion there and pretty soon you are talking real money.” It is helpful to translate these highly abstract big numbers into the real goods and services one could command with this money.
A state-of-the-art naval destroyer costs about one billion, about the cost of an NBA franchise. One can add a few luxury homes and still have spent only a small fraction of one’s wealth. Clearly possession of an ever-growing stream of goods seems to be an unlikely motivator of the mega wealthy.
During the pandemic, as during the world finance crisis, power has been both the means and the end of domestic and international economic policy. During the early stages of the global economic crisis, government responded by creating a $700 billion facility to purchase troubled assets from banks, but only about 10 percent of these expenditures went to lowering mortgage interest rates.
Federal Reserve treatment of the big finance center banks was much more generous. It lowered the interest rate charged member banks to near zero, a figure it held for almost a decade. The effects of this policy were not neutral.
Lower rates in the financial sector were supposed to encourage new investment in the real economy but instead did little more than stimulate a bull market in stocks and cheap money to finance stock buybacks and leveraged mergers and acquisitions. (Yves Smith , founder of the blog Naked Capitalism, points out that the only industry for which cheap money is a resource that might encourage further investment is finance. So much for restoring the productivity of main street.)
Monopoly power and concentrated wealth do immense harm to the bottom third of the wealth spectrum. We have returned to Franklin Roosevelt’s one-third of a nation ill-housed, ill-clad, ill-nourished. Late last year The Los Angeles Times reported: “New research establishes that after decades of living longer and longer lives, Americans are dying earlier, cut down increasingly in the prime of life by drug overdoses, suicides, and diseases such as cirrhosis, liver cancer, and obesity… the authors of the new study suggest that the nation’s lifespan reversal is being driven by diseases linked to social and economic privation, a healthcare system with glaring gaps and blind spots, and profound psychological distress.”
So what does a better system look like? There is no complete answer, and it also seems no one person does have. But a rough framework is emerging. Part of it is provided by the ecological civilisation proposed by Jeremy Lent, one of the greatest thinkers of our age. Other elements come from Kate Raworth’s doughnut economics and the environmental thinking of Naomi Klein, Amitav Ghosh, Angaangaq Angakkorsuaq, Raj Patel and Bill McKibben. Part of the answer lies in the notion of “private sufficiency, public luxury”. Another part arises from the creation of a new conception of justice based on this simple principle: every generation, everywhere, shall have an equal right to the enjoyment of natural wealth.
So what does a better system look like? There is no complete answer, and it also seems no one person does have. But a rough framework is emerging. Part of it is provided by the ecological civilisation proposed by Jeremy Lent, one of the greatest thinkers of our age. Other elements come from Kate Raworth’s doughnut economics and the environmental thinking of Naomi Klein, Amitav Ghosh, Angaangaq Angakkorsuaq, Raj Patel and Bill McKibben. Part of the answer lies in the notion of “private sufficiency, public luxury”. Another part arises from the creation of a new conception of justice based on this simple principle: every generation, everywhere, shall have an equal right to the enjoyment of natural wealth.
The moral case for egalitarian reforms is overwhelming. Obscene wealth disparities are a product of political and economic power, not virtue or extraordinary talent. On the center Left the most popular proposals are various versions of a wealth tax. Such proposals should surely be part of any reform package.
A wealth tax would begin to redress the damage inflicted by four decades of socialism for the rich. And it should be framed that way in order to counter in advance the inevitable carping that tax reformers are motivated by envy. Nonetheless more needs to be promoted in order to address the causes as well as consequences of this inordinate wealth concentration.
Trying to address wealth inequality without addressing monopoly power is like trying to stop a boat with a hole in the bottom from sinking by bailing out the water, but not plugging up the hole.
In addition, it is essential to develop policies that give working-class citizens more voice in designing the economic instruments that will produce future wealth for us all. Antitrust law, cooperatives, labor rights to organize, and democratization of the Fed would all be parts of such reform packages.
The moral choice seems to be, do we stop life to allow capitalism to continue, or stop capitalism to allow life to continue?
The window of opportunity to make radical changes to the defunct Capitalist system is getting smaller by the day, and if not dealt wih rapidly, is surely to result in civil unrest and violence of which the likes have never been seen before.
EU-Digest
The window of opportunity to make radical changes to the defunct Capitalist system is getting smaller by the day, and if not dealt wih rapidly, is surely to result in civil unrest and violence of which the likes have never been seen before.
EU-Digest
6/26/20
Germany: Do not assume US still aspires to be a world leader, Merkel warns
The rest of the world can no longer take it for granted that the US
still aspires to be a global leader and needs to readjust its priorities
accordingly, Angela Merkel has warned.
“We grew up in the certain knowledge that the United States wanted to be a world power,” the German chancellor said in an interview with a group of six European newspapers, including the Guardian.
“Should the US now wish to withdraw from that role of its own free will, we would have to reflect on that very deeply.”
Read more at:
Do not assume US still aspires to be a world leader, Merkel warns | World news | The Guardian
“We grew up in the certain knowledge that the United States wanted to be a world power,” the German chancellor said in an interview with a group of six European newspapers, including the Guardian.
“Should the US now wish to withdraw from that role of its own free will, we would have to reflect on that very deeply.”
Read more at:
Do not assume US still aspires to be a world leader, Merkel warns | World news | The Guardian
5/25/20
USA: How Financial Triumphalists Destabilize the US Economy - The Globalist
Triumphalism serves as an opioid for the Washington establishment. It
can breathe easier if the — once upon a time justified — claims about
the United States’ economic superiority are endlessly repeated.
Such recitations have traditionally also served as an opioid for the masses. Things might not be so great for oneself, but at least “we as a nation are still number one.
That this predictable, but ill-advised reaction pattern simply kicks the can of overdue reform down the road, and even accelerates the very decline that triumphalists categorically deny is even conceivable, evidently does not concern many of the elites and their appointed soothsayers.
Read more at;
How Financial Triumphalists Destabilize the US Economy - The Globalist
Such recitations have traditionally also served as an opioid for the masses. Things might not be so great for oneself, but at least “we as a nation are still number one.
That this predictable, but ill-advised reaction pattern simply kicks the can of overdue reform down the road, and even accelerates the very decline that triumphalists categorically deny is even conceivable, evidently does not concern many of the elites and their appointed soothsayers.
Read more at;
How Financial Triumphalists Destabilize the US Economy - The Globalist
5/20/20
USA: The Coronavirus is exposing major flaws in America's political and economic structures
 |
| Staggering Food Bank lines across America |
It showed, that the Coronavirus pandemic had not only brought turmoil to America, but also that it had exposed major flaws, as to how Right Wing US politicians have manipulated Capitalism and turned it into a corrupt system of Government.
You can't escape the reality that America today is the land of great disparity, and inequality, without a social net to help those which need help, without proper healthcare for those who can't afford it, or free education for everyone, and the list goes on and on.
America needs to change for the better, and the status quo is absolutely not the answer anymore.
If not, the disparity will get worse and worse, and eventually "the party will suddenly be completely over" for the US and its lopsided Wall Street driven economy.
EU-Digest
3/27/20
USA: Coronavirus Pandemic Exposes the Drastic Absence of U.S. Global Leadership – Homeland Security Today
The coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic has exposed fundamental
weaknesses in many Western countries, including the United States and
its European allies, as they struggle to stem the tide of new cases and
respond to existing ones. Even though a significant portion of
the blame lies with China for covering up the early signs of what grew
into a pandemic, Beijing is now seeking to portray itself as a savior,
providing masks and testing kits to countries throughout the world.
China’s media has highlighted the country’s outreach to Europe, Africa,
and Asia, juxtaposing China’s benevolence with the United States.
Meanwhile, the United States is suffering from
a lack of testing kits, open hospital beds, and even basic necessities
like personal protective equipment for doctors, nurses, and medical
workers as COVID-19 cases surge. In previous times of crisis—the
HIV/AIDS epidemic and the Ebola crisis of 2014—the United States helped
lead an international response.
With COVID-19, Washington’s dearth of leadership is glaring, and will have long-lasting implications well beyond the current crisis.
By delivering much needed supplies and sending Chinese scientists and medical experts to offer advice, China is using diplomacy and soft power to recreate the narrative surrounding COVID-19. And from early indications, it seems to be working. Countries that would normally look to the United States in a time of crisis have observed Washington’s own failure to deal with the coronavirus.
Europe has also been shunned in favor of help from China. Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic declared that, when it came to assistance in battling the coronavirus, ‘the only country that can help us is China,’ while obliquely referring to European solidarity as a ‘fairy tale’ that never existed. Russian disinformation efforts have exacerbated existing tensions and complicated government responses.
The reality is, the United States has been declining as a global power for some time now. The coronavirus has merely exposed this hard truth. By abdicating leadership on the most pressing challenges of our time, from combating climate change to championing human rights, the United States has allowed an authoritarian country like China to dominate the narrative of the coronavirus response, as Beijing gains access and influence through the provision of generous aid packages and foreign assistance. European countries were neither consulted nor informed before the Trump administration imposed a travel ban on their citizens. China is effectively exploiting this rift in transatlantic relations.
Germans were furious when a story was published allegations reporting that U.S. President Donald Trump was aggressively pursuing the purchase of a German biopharmaceutical company, CureVac, in order to obtain ‘exclusive access’ to a potential coronavirus vaccine. To President Trump’s supporters, this is simply ‘America First’ operationalized. To the rest of the world, it shows an America out of touch with reality, no longer a symbol of hope that it has been for hundreds of millions of people throughout the world for decades on end.
Read more at: Coronavirus Pandemic Exposes the Drastic Absence of U.S. Global Leadership – Homeland Security Today
With COVID-19, Washington’s dearth of leadership is glaring, and will have long-lasting implications well beyond the current crisis.
By delivering much needed supplies and sending Chinese scientists and medical experts to offer advice, China is using diplomacy and soft power to recreate the narrative surrounding COVID-19. And from early indications, it seems to be working. Countries that would normally look to the United States in a time of crisis have observed Washington’s own failure to deal with the coronavirus.
Europe has also been shunned in favor of help from China. Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic declared that, when it came to assistance in battling the coronavirus, ‘the only country that can help us is China,’ while obliquely referring to European solidarity as a ‘fairy tale’ that never existed. Russian disinformation efforts have exacerbated existing tensions and complicated government responses.
The reality is, the United States has been declining as a global power for some time now. The coronavirus has merely exposed this hard truth. By abdicating leadership on the most pressing challenges of our time, from combating climate change to championing human rights, the United States has allowed an authoritarian country like China to dominate the narrative of the coronavirus response, as Beijing gains access and influence through the provision of generous aid packages and foreign assistance. European countries were neither consulted nor informed before the Trump administration imposed a travel ban on their citizens. China is effectively exploiting this rift in transatlantic relations.
Germans were furious when a story was published allegations reporting that U.S. President Donald Trump was aggressively pursuing the purchase of a German biopharmaceutical company, CureVac, in order to obtain ‘exclusive access’ to a potential coronavirus vaccine. To President Trump’s supporters, this is simply ‘America First’ operationalized. To the rest of the world, it shows an America out of touch with reality, no longer a symbol of hope that it has been for hundreds of millions of people throughout the world for decades on end.
Read more at: Coronavirus Pandemic Exposes the Drastic Absence of U.S. Global Leadership – Homeland Security Today
3/11/20
USA - Economic Chaos: Dow Jones Today, Stocks Retreat: Cruise Lines, Airlines, Oil Prices Under Pressure; Gilead Sciences, Regeneron Rise| Investor's Business Daily
Stocks returned to their early lows Wednesday, as the market retreated following Tuesday's volatile rebound. Chemicals maker Dow (DOW)
was among the hardest hit on the Dow Jones today, after providing a
coronavirus update to its financials. Airlines were under presure after a
series of analyst downgrades due to Covid-19 impact. Biotechs posted
some of the morning's few gains, with Gilead Sciences (GILD) staking out an early lead.
Marriott International (MAR) tumbled 7.8%, the worst loss among Nasdaq 100 stocks. Airline stocks retreated from Tuesday's gains, with American Airlines Group (AAL) falling 6.7% and United Airlines Holdings (UAL) down 6.8% and also near the bottom of the Nasdaq 100. Both stocks received analyst downgrades, and Goldman trimmed its forecast for passenger air traffic by 7% for 2020, due to coronavirus impact.
Gilead Sciences posted a lonely gain among Nasdaq 100 stocks, up almost 2%.
Oil names slipped to the bottom of the S&P 500, with producers Noble (NBL), Apache (APA) and Occidental Petroleum (OXY) all down more than 12%. Coronavirus-stricken cruise lines were also steering back toward lows. Royal Caribbean Cruises (RCL) tumbled 6.2%. Carnival (CCL) took a 6.1% dive.
Read more at: Dow Jones Today, Stocks Retreat: Cruise Lines, Airlines, Oil Prices Under Pressure; Gilead Sciences, Regeneron Rise| Investor's Business Daily
Marriott International (MAR) tumbled 7.8%, the worst loss among Nasdaq 100 stocks. Airline stocks retreated from Tuesday's gains, with American Airlines Group (AAL) falling 6.7% and United Airlines Holdings (UAL) down 6.8% and also near the bottom of the Nasdaq 100. Both stocks received analyst downgrades, and Goldman trimmed its forecast for passenger air traffic by 7% for 2020, due to coronavirus impact.
Gilead Sciences posted a lonely gain among Nasdaq 100 stocks, up almost 2%.
Oil names slipped to the bottom of the S&P 500, with producers Noble (NBL), Apache (APA) and Occidental Petroleum (OXY) all down more than 12%. Coronavirus-stricken cruise lines were also steering back toward lows. Royal Caribbean Cruises (RCL) tumbled 6.2%. Carnival (CCL) took a 6.1% dive.
Read more at: Dow Jones Today, Stocks Retreat: Cruise Lines, Airlines, Oil Prices Under Pressure; Gilead Sciences, Regeneron Rise| Investor's Business Daily
2/20/20
Corona Virus: WHO says no time for complacency as China coronavirus cases fall
A continued decline in the number of new cases of coronavirus infections in China is encouraging, the World Health Organization said Thursday, but it is too early to know if this trend will continue.
"We are encouraged by this trend but this is no time for complacency," the WHO's director general, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, told a briefing in Geneva.
He also noted that the number of coronavirus cases in the rest of world was very low compared to inside China, but added: "That may not stay the same for very long."
In China, officials have been pointing to evidence that new cases were declining as proof they are succeeding in keeping the virus largely contained to Hubei province and its capital Wuhan, where the virus initially emerged. But revisions to their methodology have raised doubts about the data. Under the latest methodology, which excludes chest X-rays, China reported fewer than 400 new cases over the past day, less than a quarter of the number it had been finding in recent days under the previous method.
Read more: WHO says no time for complacency as China coronavirus cases fall | CBC News
12/31/19
USA: Will the American Global Order Survive Donald Trump? - by Michael Mandelbaum
Among the most pointed criticisms of
the presidency of Donald J. Trump is the charge that he has done
serious damage to the remarkably beneficial global political, military,
and economic arrangements that emerged from World War II, and that
preserving them depends on his departure from office. The charge is not
accurate. While it is true that Mr. Trump is no friend to the world
order he inherited with the office, he has done only modest damage to
it, and the most severe threat to it is not his creation and so will
outlive his term in office.
For seven decades after 1945, America’s alliances, its military deployments, and its support for cross-border trade and investment helped to bring peace and prosperity to much of the world. The relevant policies originated in the Oval Office. The President proposed them, persuaded the Congress and the public to support them, and took responsibility for putting them into practice. Every post-1945 President, beginning with Harry Truman, was committed to this American global role.
Then came Donald Trump. He presented himself as the exception to that pattern—skeptical of alliances, opposed to free trade, and dedicated to the proposition that the peace and prosperity that the world had enjoyed had cost the United States too much and that the policies undergirding them should, therefore, come to an end. His election in 2016 seemed to portend the demise of the world order the United States had done so much to establish and sustain.
Read more at: Will the American Global Order Survive Donald Trump? - The American Interest
For seven decades after 1945, America’s alliances, its military deployments, and its support for cross-border trade and investment helped to bring peace and prosperity to much of the world. The relevant policies originated in the Oval Office. The President proposed them, persuaded the Congress and the public to support them, and took responsibility for putting them into practice. Every post-1945 President, beginning with Harry Truman, was committed to this American global role.
Then came Donald Trump. He presented himself as the exception to that pattern—skeptical of alliances, opposed to free trade, and dedicated to the proposition that the peace and prosperity that the world had enjoyed had cost the United States too much and that the policies undergirding them should, therefore, come to an end. His election in 2016 seemed to portend the demise of the world order the United States had done so much to establish and sustain.
Read more at: Will the American Global Order Survive Donald Trump? - The American Interest
Population Growth: US has slowest population growth rate in a century as births decline
Increasing deaths and the slowdown of migration also contributed to slowest growth rate since first world war.
Read more at:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/dec/30/us-population-growth-census-2020?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Add_to_Firefox
Read more at:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/dec/30/us-population-growth-census-2020?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Add_to_Firefox
12/23/19
USA - Labor Force: life expectancy continues downward spiral, study shows - by Jorge L. Ortiz
The engine that powers the world’s most potent economy is dying at a
worrisome pace, a “distinctly American phenomenon’’ with no easily
discernible cause or simple solution.
Those are some of the conclusions from a comprehensive new study by researchers at Virginia Commonwealth University showing that mortality rates for U.S. adults ages 25-64 continue to increase, driving down the general population’s life expectancy for at least three consecutive years.
The report, “Life Expectancy and Mortality Rates in the United States, 1959-2017,’’ was published Tuesday in the Journal of the American Medical Association.
The study paints a bleak picture of a workforce plagued by drug overdoses, suicides and organ-system diseases while grappling with economic stresses.
“This looks like an excellent paper – just what we needed to help unravel the overall decline in life expectancy in the U.S.,’’ said Eileen Crimmins, an associate dean at the University of Southern California who’s an expert on the link between health and socioeconomic factors.
Read more at: US life expectancy continues downward spiral, study shows
Those are some of the conclusions from a comprehensive new study by researchers at Virginia Commonwealth University showing that mortality rates for U.S. adults ages 25-64 continue to increase, driving down the general population’s life expectancy for at least three consecutive years.
The report, “Life Expectancy and Mortality Rates in the United States, 1959-2017,’’ was published Tuesday in the Journal of the American Medical Association.
The study paints a bleak picture of a workforce plagued by drug overdoses, suicides and organ-system diseases while grappling with economic stresses.
“This looks like an excellent paper – just what we needed to help unravel the overall decline in life expectancy in the U.S.,’’ said Eileen Crimmins, an associate dean at the University of Southern California who’s an expert on the link between health and socioeconomic factors.
Read more at: US life expectancy continues downward spiral, study shows
12/6/19
USA: Why is tourism to the United States on the decline? - Gun Violence
The decrease isn't steep, but any decline is seen as alarming, given the overall rise in global tourism.
One of the major reasons for this decline in tourism to the US is the fear of gun violence in America, which is widely publicized around the world.
Read more at:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/travel/2019/09/06/more-people-are-traveling-world-than-ever-number-coming-america-is-dropping/
One of the major reasons for this decline in tourism to the US is the fear of gun violence in America, which is widely publicized around the world.
Read more at:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/travel/2019/09/06/more-people-are-traveling-world-than-ever-number-coming-america-is-dropping/
5/28/19
US Labor Unions 200 years of struggle and final decline: History of Labor Unions in the US, incuding VIDEO
of Labor Unions in the US, incuding VIDEO
The lifespan of American labor unions is shaped like a bell-curve
struggling to climb at first, then riding high, and finally today
crashing out.
The whole up-and-down took about 200 years total. We need to go back to the 1830s. UC Santa Cruz Professor William Domhoff writes, "Industrial development in the early nineteenth century slowly widened the gap between employers and skilled workers, so the workers began to think of industrial factories as a threat to both their wages and status."
Craft unions began to form but stayed mostly local, focused on clout and working conditions. Then in 1869, Domhoff says, the Knights of Labor was founded as "a secret society by a handful of Philadelphia garment cutters, who had given up on their own craft union as having any chance to succeed" and turned to galvanizing other workers through meetings and parades.
Eventually, violence became part of the picture. The Great Railroad Strike of 1877, sparked by railroad companies slashing wages by 10% and doubling some workers'
responsibilities.
And while no major law ultimately clamped down on the groups, "unions came under attack — in the workplace, in the courts, and in public policy. As a result, union membership has fallen and income inequality has worsened — reaching levels not seen since the 1920s," says the,Economic Policy Institute.
Read more at: History of Labor Unions in the US (VIDEO)
The whole up-and-down took about 200 years total. We need to go back to the 1830s. UC Santa Cruz Professor William Domhoff writes, "Industrial development in the early nineteenth century slowly widened the gap between employers and skilled workers, so the workers began to think of industrial factories as a threat to both their wages and status."
Craft unions began to form but stayed mostly local, focused on clout and working conditions. Then in 1869, Domhoff says, the Knights of Labor was founded as "a secret society by a handful of Philadelphia garment cutters, who had given up on their own craft union as having any chance to succeed" and turned to galvanizing other workers through meetings and parades.
Eventually, violence became part of the picture. The Great Railroad Strike of 1877, sparked by railroad companies slashing wages by 10% and doubling some workers'
responsibilities.
And while no major law ultimately clamped down on the groups, "unions came under attack — in the workplace, in the courts, and in public policy. As a result, union membership has fallen and income inequality has worsened — reaching levels not seen since the 1920s," says the,Economic Policy Institute.
Read more at: History of Labor Unions in the US (VIDEO)
4/20/19
U.S. and Israel Both Decline on Press-freedom Index - U.S. Now "Problematic"
For the third time in three years, the United States’ standing in an annual index of press freedom declined, a result the report’s authors attributed to President Trump’s anti-press rhetoric and continuing threats to journalists.
Reporters Without Borders, the international group that compiles the World Press Freedom Index, ranked the United States 48th among 180 nations and territories it surveyed. The U.S. ranking fell three spots from 2018, continuing a downward trend that began in 2016.
The United States finished just above Senegal and just below Romania on this year’s list/ The United States finished just above Senegal and just below Romania on this year’s list. It also fell into the ranks of countries whose treatment of journalists is considered “problematic,” the first time the United States has been so classified since the organization began the index in 2002.
The top ranks were dominated once again by European countries: Norway ranked first for the third time in a row, followed by Finland, Sweden, Netherlands and Denmark. The bottom of the list included, in descending order, Vietnam, China, Eritrea, North Korea and Turkmenistan.
Read more at:
https://www.haaretz.com/us-news/u-s-and-israel-both-decline-on-press-freedom-index-1.7138187
https://www.haaretz.com/us-news/u-s-and-israel-both-decline-on-press-freedom-index-1.7138187
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